


Starlit Skies

by noero



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Pre-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2017-08-28
Packaged: 2018-12-21 02:26:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11934378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noero/pseuds/noero
Summary: Anger sits on his tongue like poison. He swallows it, fills the empty chasm in his belly, and insulates himself with it. He reminds himself of its presence over and over again with the acrid taste and how it burns down his throat. He feels safe as long as it’s there, the outermost layer of his thickest skin.





	Starlit Skies

**Author's Note:**

> I'm slow on the uptake so here's some long-overdue generic exploration on Keith dealing with Shiro's disappearance just after it happens. No real spoilers for Season 3.

The day he goes missing, Keith steals Shiro’s shirt from the bottom drawer underneath his bed. It’s folded neatly but thoroughly worn. He doesn’t know what he wants to do with it so he hides it in the bottom drawer under his own bed.

A cycle passses.

Then two.

At first, everything is a blur. Night never falls where they are. Keith’s reality sinks in only when the castle goes silent, everyone too exhausted to hold on for another second, and Keith thinks they’re too fragile and feeble. Too normal and careless. They're not like him.

Because Keith hasn’t slept in in forty-six vargas but all he can do is stare at the black space before him. The void, filled with pinprick stars, makes him feel caged behind the glass windows. He can feel their light like needles, biting into his skin.

Regrets are a dime a dozen these days. He’d screamed when Allura called off the search, for one selfish second, not caring about how she flinched beneath his words. He’d screamed until his throat was raw, until there were tears in the corners of her eyes. It weighs on him now, one wave of guilt after another, because he knows that she knows how this feels. He’s seen that intimate pain in the lines of her face, even when no one else did, and that should make him care more. If he was a better person he’d care more than anyone.

But anger sits on his tongue like poison, still. He swallows it, fills the empty chasm in his belly, and insulates himself with it. He reminds himself of its presence over and over again with the acrid taste and how it burns down his throat. He feels safe as long as it’s there. The outermost layer of his thickest skin.

Keith remembers when Shiro smiled at him on a day when his life was still a tangled mess. They were on earth, warm sunlight on the back of his neck, and Shiro convinced Keith to enlist. 

Late summer, Keith recalls, when he’d felt at home for the first time in his life. Shiro told him he was better than he was, and Keith didn’t believed it — not really, stubborn as he was — but he’d listened to and swallowed every word Shiro said. Then, his mouth had filled with something sweeter. A different kind of poison.

The memories color the edge of Keith’s mind.

“You’re going to be fine,” Shiro said, and he’d placed his hand on Keith’s arm for the very first time. 

Keith blinked and made a soft, involuntary sound. Shiro tensed, ready to back away before Keith relaxed and eased toward the touch. Keith smiled, face gone soft, “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

Keith had believed it, just that once. He is the only thing Shiro has ever been wrong about. 

He doesn’t want to fight this war. He wants to be selfish and go home, just like Hunk and Lance want in their childish fantasies, the entire universe be damned. Only, Keith can’t go home. His home was taken from him, ripped right out of his chest, breaking his ribs along the way. He is trapped here, no choices left to him. 

Part of him is angry with Shiro too. As angry as he is with Allura, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge. As angry as he is with himself. 

Shiro was wrong about him. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

It's too late.

Keith sighs, closes his eyes and clenches his fists, nails digging mercilessly into his palms. His teeth ache and he whispers empty thoughts into the dark. He doesn’t pray, he never has. He doesn’t like promises either. They break, shatter, and crumble at his feet. Words are worthless.

Tomorrow he’ll pick everything up again. He'll shove it down, rebuild his walls, and keep trudging along. Everyone else can give up, that’s fine, because Keith is strong enough by himself. He’s done this all before and he can do it again. He’s still alive. And he has hope. He won’t let that go.

But right now? Right now, with tired eyes and an aching heart, he lets himself fall pitifully into grief. He lets himself be consumed by the heavy dread opening up his chest. He lets panic grip him by the throat again, the way it did when he stared at the Black Lion’s empty cockpit.

The silence of the room torments him enough he's not disturbed by the way his mind unravels. He's not put off by his own lack of respect. He doesn’t pull Shiro’s shirt out from underneath his bed, though he wants to so badly. He wants lay it beside his pillow and sleep for a year. He wants to pull it over his shoulders and let it lay against his skin. 

He knows it’s there all the same, a presence out of sight, but Keith knows it’s there, close but out of reach. He wants it to stay that way.

He thinks of how the fabric would feel beneath his fingertips. He thinks of how it would smell. He thinks of holding it to his chest, like a child. 

He can be like this for now. This is enough for now. Someday he'll be able to touch Shiro again.

So he thinks he’ll keep it there, beneath his bed, where it’s safe, and give it back to Shiro when he returns. He won’t risk anyone else touching it, taking it. The stolen shirt can replace the mantle of the Black Paladin. No one can take those things from either of them. When Shiro returns, Keith won’t let it happen again—

Another promise. 

A promise he’s already made.

More broken and worthless words.

Because Shiro is gone and there’s not a thing Keith can do. And the universe is too large now, threatening to swallow him whole; anger, emptiness, and all. Keith only hopes it does. He has nothing to his name. He has no home to return to. 

It’s just him and the vast black sky, filled with needle-sharp stars.

**Author's Note:**

> hey come hang out with me on [tumblr](http://lionpilots.tumblr.com) or [twitter](http://www.twitter.com/artbyros).


End file.
